X marks the [literary] spot

February 3, 2019 5:47 AM

For 2019, I'm doing an A-Z reading challenge (one book for each letter of the alphabet, all published in 2018). I'm having trouble coming up with some of the letters, particularly X -- I guess no one was writing about Xena Warrior Princess last year or something -- so I'm turning to the Hive Mind for help; open to suggestions for other books on the proposed list as well. Full list inside.

I'm genre-agnostic with a natural tendency to literary fiction but am actively trying to expand my reading universe to include more non-fiction and authors outside the US/UK bubble. Strike-throughs = books I've finished in January. Apologies for any formatting funk but I tried to retain a table-ish structure for ease.

American Marriage............................Tayari Jones
Becoming..........................................Michelle Obama
Census..............................................Jesse Ball
Dread Nation....................................Justina Ireland
Everything Happens for a Reason...Kate Bowler
Female Persuasion...........................Meg Wolitzer
Good and Mad..................................Rebecca Traister
Hazel Wood.......................................Melissa Albert
Immortalists......................................Chloe Benjamin
Jagannath Stories.............................Karin Tidbeck
Kiss Quotient.....................................Helen Hoang
Ladder to the Sky..............................John Boyne
Mars Room........................................Rachel Kushner
Night Diary.........................................Veera Hirandani
Overstory...........................................Richard Powers
Prince and the Dressmaker..............Jen Wang
Queen of Hearts...............................Kimmery Martin
Red Clocks........................................Leni Zumas
She Would Be King...........................Wayetu Moore
There There......................................Tommy Orange
Unsheltered.....................................Barbara Kingsolver
Varina...............................................Charles Frazier
Widows of Malabar Hill....................Sujata Massey
??????................................................??????????
Your Duck is My Duck.......................Deborah Eisenberg
Zenith...............................................Sasha Alberg

posted by basalganglia to Writing & Language (8 answers total)

I guess you know about this list already?

Not sure how many if any were released in 2018, you'd have to Xplore.
posted by luaz at 5:59 AM on February 3, 2019

Best answer: I don’t know if it technically counts, but The Poet X came out in 2018.
posted by suri at 6:07 AM on February 3, 2019 [3 favorites]

Best answer: There's a YA novel by Virginia Bergin called The XY--it's a near-future dystopian novel set in a world where a virus killed almost all biologically-born men.
posted by box at 6:18 AM on February 3, 2019 [1 favorite]

Best answer: Searching WorldCat mainly gives you lots of X-Men books, but there is also X Marks the Scot and X Marks the Spot, which are murder mystery and erotica respectively.
posted by Bloxworth Snout at 6:41 AM on February 3, 2019 [1 favorite]

And X-ed.
posted by Bloxworth Snout at 6:42 AM on February 3, 2019

Interesting list, basaslganglia! – I really enjoyed reading your D, H, and N during the last year.

Mostly, I want to amplify the suggestion of Poet X. It's a wonderful, special book. Well worth your time. I don't think you need to look any further. It's one of a very, very few YA novels I've read that deals directly with the three-way collision between religiousness, adolescence, and the messiness of human bodies.

But if you do want to look further, I've got two ideas: first is a funky little graphic memoir of Malcolm X written by his daughter, Ilyasha Shabazz (with Kekla Magoon), X: A Novel . It's fun, pretty, and inspiring. [Edit: I missed that you wanted books published in 2018. This ain't one of 'em, but it's still grand].

Second, if you're okay with a *tiny* bit of a cheat, is Jeff VanderMeer's Southern Reach trilogy. It's sometimes published under the title 'Area X: The Southern Reach Trilogy. I think at least one newly anthologized version released in 2018. If you're trying to expand your reading horizons, it's a good initial step into contemp weird/cosmic fiction.
posted by mr. remy at 6:55 AM on February 3, 2019 [3 favorites]

I would probably cheat and pick a different year....but XX, by Angela Chadwick, came out last year. From the description: "When Rosie and Jules discover a ground-breaking clinical trial that enables two women to have a female baby, they jump at the chance to make history."
posted by pinochiette at 7:43 AM on February 3, 2019

Response by poster: Thanks for the suggestions. WorldCat is a great resource, I don't know why I didn't think of that before! I've also gotten several IRL recommendations for The Poet X, so I think I might just use that for "P", and XY for X.

Happy reading, fellow book-lovers of Mefi!
posted by basalganglia at 3:57 PM on February 3, 2019